In 2009, my then-partner Lexi Fontein started freelancing as a brand and digital designer and I became a not-so-silent-investor in her business. By 2013 we had moved down to Cape Town, had 5 employees, 3 dogs and a parrot in our master bedroom. I came onboard as Co-Founder focusing on business development. The business became too big and we moved into an office, first in Muizenberg overlooking Surfer’s Corner and then into The Woodstock Exchange close to the CBD.

Wonderland Collective made its name doing three things:

  1. Moving our clients towards having and acting on a mission.

  2. Creating a brand that clearly reflected that mission.

  3. Creating a digital platform in line with the mission.

    We launched over 50 digital platforms, from websites for wine brands and apps for popstars to helping the Global Innovation Fund make it easier for emerging market businesses to apply and get funded. We made the brand for Luno, one of the world’s most recognised crypto companies with over 10m customers in 40 countries. We made our own startup: a bacon subscription service, including a pop-up bar, and did the world’s largest Matterport scan of a commercial area. Below are some examples of our work:

In 2016 we moved to London and opened an office in Hanbury Street, Shoreditch. The idea was to have a hub-and-spoke model for the business: win work in developed markets and then ship it back to Cape Town to be produced. At the same time, a partner from the UAE approached us about opening an office in Dubai which we did in 2017. I took on a more strategic role in the business: setting the short, medium and long term outlook, leading the recruitment practice and generally being the face of the business at events and online.

In 2018, after hiring a total of 23 people we sold our business to a consulting partner and exited.